Increased fractional anisotropy in the motor tracts of Parkinson's disease suggests compensatory neuroplasticity or selective neurodegeneration

Mole, Jilu Princy, Subramanian, Leena, Bracht, Tobias, Morris, Huw, Metzler-Baddeley, Claudia ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8646-1144 and Linden, David Edmund Johannes ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5638-9292 2016. Increased fractional anisotropy in the motor tracts of Parkinson's disease suggests compensatory neuroplasticity or selective neurodegeneration. European Radiology 26 (10) , pp. 3327-3335. 10.1007/s00330-015-4178-1

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Abstract

Objective To determine the differences in motor pathways and selected non-motor pathways of the basal ganglia in Parkinson’s disease (PD) patients compared to healthy controls (HCs). Methods We analysed diffusion weighted imaging data of 24 PD patients and 26 HCs. We performed deterministic tractography analysis using the spherical deconvolution-based damped Richardson-Lucy algorithm and subcortical volume analysis. Results We found significantly increased fractional anisotropy (FA) in the motor pathways of PD patients: the bilateral corticospinal tract (right; corrected p = 0.0003, left; corrected p = 0.03), bilateral thalamus-motor cortex tract (right; corrected p = 0.02, left; corrected p = 0.004) and the right supplementary area-putamen tract (corrected p = 0.001). We also found significantly decreased FA in the right uncinate fasiculus (corrected p = 0.01) and no differences of FA in the bilateral supero-lateral medial forebrain bundles (p > 0.05) of PD patients compared to HCs. There were no subcortical volume differences (p > 0.05) between the PD patients and HCs. Conclusion These results can inform biological models of neurodegeneration and neuroplasticity in PD. We suggest that increased FA values in the motor tracts in PD may reflect compensatory reorganization of neural circuits indicative of adaptive or extended neuroplasticity. Key points • Fractional anisotropy was higher in motor pathways of PD patients compared to healthy controls. • Fractional anisotropy was lower in the uncinate fasciculus of PD patients compared to healthy controls. • Increased fractional anisotropy could suggest adaptive neuroplasticity or selective neurodegeneration.

Item Type:	Article
Date Type:	Publication
Status:	Published
Schools:	MRC Centre for Neuropsychiatric Genetics and Genomics (CNGG) Cardiff University Brain Research Imaging Centre (CUBRIC) Medicine Neuroscience and Mental Health Research Institute (NMHRI) Psychology
Subjects:	R Medicine > RC Internal medicine > RC0321 Neuroscience. Biological psychiatry. Neuropsychiatry
Publisher:	Springer Verlag
ISSN:	0938-7994
Funders:	Wellcome Trust
Date of First Compliant Deposit:	30 March 2016
Date of Acceptance:	2015
Last Modified:	16 May 2024 20:34
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/80397

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